He stopped.
A folded paper had been tucked behind the ledger binding.
Old.
Water-stained.
Sealed once, though the seal had broken from age.
The agent stared at the writing on the outside.
Then at the rancher.
His face lost color.
The rancher noticed.
“What is it?”
The county agent removed the paper slowly.
“Your family name is on this.”
The rancher frowned.
“My name?”
“No.”
“Your family's.”
The county agent unfolded it.
The paper shook slightly in his hands.
He read the first line silently.
Then the second.
He looked toward the toddler.
The rancher felt a strange coldness move through him despite the rain.
“What?”
The agent did not answer.
“Read it.”
The county agent looked toward the children.
Then toward the rancher.
“This was written by the little girl's mother.”
The rancher’s chest tightened.
“Who was she?”
The county agent read the name.
The world seemed to lose sound.
Rain still fell.
Horse tack still jingled.
Somewhere across the street a wagon moved.
But the rancher heard none of it.
He stared at the agent.
“Say that again.”
The county agent did.
The rancher's younger sister.
The sister he had not seen in eleven years.
The sister who had left the family ranch after a fight so vicious that neither sibling ever apologized.
The sister whose last known letter came from Idaho.
The sister he later heard had married badly.
The sister he had searched for once, then stopped searching after pride convinced him that if she wanted to be found, she would write.
The county agent looked at the little girl.
Then back at him.
“She was her mother.”
The rancher’s knees almost failed.
He looked toward the toddler.
Same eyes.
He had not noticed.
Or perhaps he had.
A familiarity without a name.
The county agent unfolded another section.
“The widow wrote notes beneath the letter.”
“What notes?”
The agent read.
“Mother died from fever two years ago.”
“Father unknown or gone.”